Sonic X Shadow Generations thread, movie level out now

SA2's rankings could be kinda arbitrary, but the point is the target audience doesn't need an A rank to begin with so why hand S ranks out for free? Why have a ranking system at all if we're assuming a low rank inherently hurts a child's feelings? Five year old me certainly didn't mind because I had no expectation that I should be immediately amazing at SA2 to begin with, and the only characters that even give flippant remarks are Sonic the impatient guy and the literal villains. I certainly felt condescended to as a 12 year old getting an S rank on my first try at Windmill Isle Act 1 but I guess my target audience reaction doesn't count.

 

Yeah it's not good logic because it basically extends all the way upwards. Once grade inflation set in I saw people getting miffed when they got B ranks knowing A and S were out there.

Either commit to having ranks or don't bother IMO.

 

now that I think about it I'm remembering my reaction to getting an E rank in Unleashed and hearing the music where the orchestra plays off key, I was like 10 years old when that game came out and I thought that shit was funny as hell I can't lie

 

Shadow Gens is a lot better with rankings than I expected tbh. Aside from the early stages it feels like I've really had to work just to get an A rank. Radical Highway especially, I've spent a lot of time in both levels and still haven't managed the S rank...

Sonic Gens still the king of awful rankings though, nothing that Forces or Frontiers has can compare to Red Ring hunting in Planet Wisp Act 1 for 8 minutes and still walking out with an A rank.

 

Yea my first runs weren’t a guaranteed S rank, I had to replay levels a couple times before I got comfortable enough to go faster.

 

I maintain that Lost World made the best choice about ranks, by taking them out of the main campaign and adding them as a side option. You could have them be as brutal as you want that way, casual players can go the whole game without even realizing they exist.

 

I think you do want to push the player to replay levels and get better at them in a Sonic game and ranks are a great way to do that, because otherwise players might not realize how much depth there is to the game.

Here's a good example: the Arkham games have some great combat systems with a lot of depth and options, but some people complain it's a shallow button masher because you don't really get punished much (Batman is very durable and there's plenty of checkpoints) and you don't get properly ranked at the end of a fight. But there are challenge rooms in the game that give you a detailed result screen and a medal if you did well, which makes it much easier to gauge if you could be doing better. The people who complain it's just button mashing haven't simply been properly motivated to get better at the game because there's no indication they're not properly engaging with the mechanics.

If you're the kind of player who just mashes boost, gets hit a lot yet still beats the level then the F rank you get is at least a good indicator that you're doing terrible, if you don't care about how you rank then there's at least some feedback to know you could be doing better, and if you do care then getting higher ranks (when they're actually challenging to get) feels fantastic. That's a good enough reason to keep them for me.

 

This was definitely a peak humour moment in the series, it caught me totally off guard the first time, even again after a decade long break from gaming, I’d forgotten it.

Unexpected humour is one of my favourite things about people.

Thanks for bringing up the memory, needed the smile today!

 

One of the best things I did to my copy of ShGens was adding the HMM code that disables air deceleration from jumping, it makes the game feel so much better as I was missing the short hop from SoGens

 

By cutting down on the amount of folks exposed to the ranks though you're chipping away at their intended purpose: To get players who otherwise wouldn't be engaging with replays to realize the point is to come back and do better. On the flip side, someone who's queueing up some kind of time trial and or score attack is probably already mindful of that and doesn't need the extra push to begin with. I've been trying to get the "score tally" screen to go on for as long as possible since I was a kid. I'd probably be fine if Sonic just went back to a time and score system with no grade attached, but I'm not the type of person who needs the push.

You're basically weighing against whether it's worth it to alienate some folks to open up a new lane of enjoyment for others. It's not a clear cut binary thing imo.

 

I don't see why the ranking system can't be a thing they directly ask if you want on/off before starting a campaign.

I mean it's a tacky idea, and I'd probably leave it on, but if they like making people choose control schemes or physics presets now in pop-ups then I definitely don't see why not. If anything, it's a less intrusive thing to toggle than those are.

 

I don't like being judged and reminded that there are degrees of success to my actions when I'm supposed to be a hero on an adventure. That shit discourages me from coming back. Who wants to play a game that keeps calling them a stupid dipshit after putting them through a hard stage? I'm supposed to want to impress Sonic? Change his opinion on whether I'm good at his game? Even though he shouldn't give a shit?

It being one option is the best argument against removing it entirely, same as lives. It's not alienating people unless you're really that concerned about the "incapable of looking at a menu" demographic missing out on trying to get S-ranks. May as well make them even easier at that rate.

 

I wish I could impress Sonic.

 

1. me, 2. yes, 3. yes, and 4. he does give a shit (or at least he did, at one point).

it's perfectly fine if you're not into that vibe, but, like, the rankings are core to what distinguishes sonic from his platforming contemporaries. he's not just about getting to the end, but doing so in the coolest way possible. sonic is to platformers what dmc / bayonetta are to traditional beat-em-ups - they're not games that can be perfected, they're games that are meant to be perfected, and the ranking system (and the fact that they all star highly stylish protagonists whose power is derived from skill and dexterity rather than raw strength) is a core part of that experience. they're not power fantasies - they're mastery fantasies. you are absolutely supposed to "impress" sonic, in the sense that you're meant to aspire to have your gameplay resemble what "canon" sonic would look like going through the level - flawlessly, with flair and grace.

the idea that rankings are somehow secondary to the main experience is totally out of step with the reality of how the games have been designed since day 1 - it's not a coincidence that nearly all the mainline games (and many of the spinoffs) feature some kind of ranking system. the reason why the piss-easy s-ranks post-colors are such a design issue is because they undermine that core vision that sonic team has been pushing since the beginning - if i get to the end of a sonic gens level and completely shit the bed in a way that canon sonic (or shadow) never would and get rewarded with an "s-rank" anyway, my incentive to push the game's mechanics to the point where i can achieve ideal performance is greatly diminished, and it gives the impression that "peak sonic performance" is totally compatible with running headfirst into damage or tip-toeing around platforming obstacles, which it clearly isn't.

yes, this will mean certain players will feel discouraged, but it's important to note that if you're truly playing just for fun, getting a low rank won't matter to you at all - the ranks only really bother people who are seeking to "feel like spiderman" (so to speak) but who don't want to actually grind to do so. that's totally valid as a preference, but it has literally never been what sonic has been about in any iteration. the focus on mastery is among the only points of consistency across the entire franchise, and it makes sense that it would be - designing a game around repeated replays is one of the ways you get around the inherent constraints of having to make enormous levels that last two minutes.

(* haven't played lost world, idk what the ranks are like in that game)

 

I'll never cease to be amazed at the argument against a performance measurement feature being "but it might FRUSTRATE someone". Candy Crush moms can handle that. Surely they, too, hate feeling like they suck. I say this not meaning to belittle anyone, in a "even THEY can do it, you pussy" kind of way; but pointing out how even the most casual audience imaginable can and will engage with a level several times just to get a third star, pestering you and your family for lives all the way.

That's because Candy Crush is very effective at not making people feel judged! Maybe it's about letting people know the requirements beforehand, allowing you to negotiate how much you even want a higher rank to begin with. Maybe it's about there being a lot of ways to get the necessary score count to achieve three stars. Maybe it's in how stars are actually required for something or other, making it so that the actual, declared objective is to perfect your score, not just beat a level.

Surely there is a way to bake in rank systems in a game in a way that makes progressing with them satisfying. Not as an option. Either you commit to the bit or you don't (but please do)

 

I agree with all of this, especially something that makes how you get a better ranking clear.

As a kid, I loved replaying stages in SA2, but I routinely got bad rankings... I didn't really care because playing the game was fun, but I never shot for better scores since I didn't know what the game wanted me to do in order to improve my score.

...Maybe the little "Cool!" "Radical!" pop-ups in the corner of my screen shoulda been a clue, but still.

Also, I think the act of giving stars reads different psychologically from being assigned a letter grade.

Like, even if you perform poorly, the game is still giving you a star. Maybe that's just a better feedback loop than a letter grade for encouraging replays and mastery.

 

I need a heeeeroooo, I need a hero to show up whenever he wants! He's gotta be weak and he's gotta be slow because making judgements is baaaad (like calling someone a herooooo~)

It's true we never needed letter rankings though. I've always been a fan of Advance 3's subtle system that just colors the goal ring like a gold/silver/bronze trophy depending on how you did. Maybe add a platinum one as an S-rank equivalent and you're good.

 

not your fault at all, and even though i prefer sa2's more comprehensive approach to rankings, the game does a pretty terrible job emphasizing the importance of tricks / combos vs. clear time. this is something that tutorialization-by-example can fix - a lot of arcade game attract modes are just footage of high-level play, and that can be very instructive to players trying to figure out what optimal play is supposed to look like. a system like this - or even having a replay system that ships with S-rank level footage from the devs out of the box - would do quite a lot to make skill acquisition seem more achievable for newbies

 

I agree that ranking systems have been a part of video games from the beginning, and I appreciate that Sonic continues to incorporate them into its gameplay.

I understand that everyone has different skill levels, and I sympathize with that. Personally, I’ve never found Sonic games particularly hard, though certain parts have given me trouble.

For example, collecting Chaos Emeralds in the classic or Advance games back when I was a kid, completing certain missions in games like Sonic Adventure 1/2 or Unleashed, and dealing with specific bosses or levels have been challenging at times.

Even this game gave me a bit of trouble. I played the Generations section first, and when I reached the first Ark level in the Shadow side, it threw me off, and I got a B rank. It took me two tries to adjust and earn an S rank.

I agree with the point that aiming for an S rank helped me get used to Shadow's gameplay loop, making the rest of the game more manageable. The only thing that caught me off guard again was the Doom Morph controls, but once I figured them out, it was fine.

I appreciated that this game provides a helpful tip by showing the time needed for the next rank in the end results. I think more tips for each level could be beneficial, especially for players struggling. The game already hints at this by having characters point out important areas in the OG Generations, but expanding on that would help even more.

It would also be cool if the game included videos demonstrating how to tackle levels, time attacks, or specific missions for players needing guidance. People already turn to YouTube for this, so why not include it in the game and eliminate the middleman?

Another option could be adding an easy mode where rank requirements are way lower. This way, players could still earn achievements and unlockables without as much frustration.

 

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Kids that own in Fortnite and other video games. Give the target audience some credit here.